World of Philosophy

Author(s): Christopher Key Chapple, Intaj Malek, Dilip Charan, Sunanda Shastri, Prashant Dave
Publisher: Shanti Prakashan

Page 649

explanation as per his understanding with a view to proving the superiority and greatness of the Nätha..
In order to get the blessings of this eminent Nätha, in fact, Gorakṣanatha, Krsna questions his Guru Gargamuni about the origin of Gorakṣanatha, His mantra, the technique (Tantra} to worship him, His greatness and other deeds or feats etc. To his various queries, Gargamuni gives reply in the form the Gorakṣasahasranama.
As I said earlier, the traits of the Nätha, as described herein, are a clear reflection of the similar traits of the major Gods like Visnu, Śiva etc. described in devotional texts extolling these Gods to the skies. This tendency is definitely influenced by the traditionally assigned qualities of the Highest Gods.
In the present Sahasranama, the poet/devotee has tried his best to coin one thousand names of the Natha to complete the necessary number of epithets. He has, however, had to take recourse to certain imaginary ideas to carry out this difficult task and hence, herein peeps the clumsiness, ambiguity and far-flung or far-fetched and fanciful and sometimes meaningless letters for coining the names, to which now I turn my attention.
One peculiarity of the composer of this Sahasranama is that from verse no.88 onwards, he suddenly starts enumerating the names of the Nätha, according to the alphabetical order of the Devanagari script, for reasons best known to him. Firstly, he coins the names that begin with the vowels and from verse 98 onwards, he coins words beginning with the consonants. Consequently, he has coined certain names without bothering to know whether they carry any significant meanings or not. Thus, he unknowingly fails to escape the evident pitfalls, due to this typical tendency and that is the raison detre for this short paper. Owing to the shortage of space and time, I shall deal with only a few such names and their etymological explanations offered by the equally devout follower/commentator.
I give the Sanskrit Text or such examples, which could be easily multiplied, but, space and time prevent me from dilating on this topic.
It is hoped that this brief paper will throw light on the scholarship of the commentator who tries to do justice to the Text on which he is commenting to bring out the Tenets of the Philosophy of the Nätha and His greatness, reflecting his deep-rooted faith.
The Sanskrit Text follows:
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